The use of cut up chunks of fish, commonly termed chum, for use in fishing is important. Bait fish, typically chum bait fish such as herring, is customarily manually cut up into chunks either on a shore location or alternatively at sea on board a fishing vessel. Commonly a fisherman, using a sharp knife and a cutting board, cuts up bait fish such as herring into chunks, typically one and 1/4 inches square, and drops the pieces in a container such as a barrel. The use of chum to attract fish, particularly with respect to commercial fishery normally involves a substantial quantity of chopped fish. While quantities vary, a full day of fishing normally will require 200 to 300 pounds of chopped fish, and when done by hand, cutting up chum normally requires about eight hours work by a crew member and consequently constitutes as a significant cost factor for a commercial fishing operator.
The slicing of fish into chum is a particularly hazardous operation as it involves the use of a sharp knife which frequently causes injury to the operator's hand. Furthermore, if chumming is done at sea where the fishing boat is subject to the rocking action of waves, the chumming operation becomes even more dangerous.
Chum is generally stored frozen and then thawed for slicing or used fresh. Furthermore, depending upon the type of fish encountered, it may be desirable to change the type of chum used to suit the taste of the fish being encountered while fishing, i.e., squid, menhaden or herring.
Prior art meat and fish cutting devices such as U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,733,437, 4,794,670 and 4,934,237, typically incorporate electrically powered cutting devices. Such cutting devices are suited for installations within buildings having a grounded or shielded electric power source/safety devices and stable mounting foundations. Furthermore, such electrically powered cutting devices substantially increase the hazard of cutting the operators hand and therefore are not suitable for either fish pier use where chumming often takes place, or alternatively at sea on board ship where chumming is done typically in the stern area of the fishing vessel.
A further aspect of chumming is that it is by nature messy, involving the production of debris such as fish blood, scales, etc. which is both messy for the operator and produces a mess in the work area as well, and requires substantial space in the work area for the cutting operation. Such operation requires clean up with a water rinse down, typically a salt water hose rinse down which is both inconvenient and time consuming, and requires a source of water either by hose or by swabbing.
Chumming by nature typically involves the cutting up a fresh bait fish such as herring having a length of 6 to 12 inches, with slicing making traverse cuts along the axis of the fish to produce chunks, preferably 11/2 square inch. Cutting of chum requires a motor driven cutting device.
It is therefore desirable to provide for a chum cutting device which is portable, economical, labor saving, versatile, can be used on ship board and ashore, light-weight and compact, easy to clean, manually operable, and rugged construction to withstand rough use at sea.